First Melodies for Ukulele : 18 familiar tunes to help folk get started with tablature. Includes tablature and staff notation so you can get to know the notes on your fretboard better at the same time.

Preliminary Notes

Choose a tablature solo that interests you. See the above suggestion, peruse the sites in the introduction to this section for a list of places to find other tablature arrangements, or (if you’re feeling ambitious) create your own.

For this level you will only focus on playing the highest note of the tablature (usually on string 1 or 2, but sometimes on string 3). Ignore all other notes/numbers. This will turn any tablature arrangement into a ‘solo line’ arrangement for your beginning use.

To start off with, you may wish to avoid arrangements that go much higher than the 5th to 7th fret, to give you a chance to focus on learning the lower half of the fretboard. This is only a suggestion though.

Find positions where your fingers can hit a whole section of the melody without shifting around alot. For instance, if your lowest note is on the 2nd fret of the 3rd string and your highest note is on the 5th fret of the 1st string, assign your index to fret 2, your middle to fret 3 and so on.

If the melody shifts around a lot between highs and lows, find logical places to change your hand position and finger assignments.

Practice slowly, using a metronome, and gradually increase your tempo as you become more comfortable playing the melody.

CHALLENGE

Earn your Instrumental Level 1 patch by demonstrating playing the melody (top notes) of a tablature solo of your choosing. The performance should highlight the following skills:

Ability to isolate the solo line from a tablature solo.

Ability to play in tempo, keeping a steady beat.

Ability to assign all four fretting fingers to logical fretting positions (i.e. a minimum of ‘sliding around’ with a single finger).